WACO - Lamar's Nikita Lis and Michael Feucht will take part in the NCAA Division I Tennis Doubles Championships, hosted by Baylor, on Thursday in the first round against the nation's No. 1 doubles team of Austin Smith and Ben Wagland from Georgia at the Hurd Tennis Center.
Lis and Feucht represent the first duo from Lamar to advance to the championships since Carlos Lopez and Joe Antle moved on in 1977. The team was an automatic selection from the Southland Conference, which is awarded to any conference with one or more eligible doubles teams ranked in the Intercollegiate Top 60.
"The guys are super excited about this opportunity," said head coach Scott Shankles. "They have been training very, very hard and are ready to represent Lamar in a very good way."
The time of the doubles match is undetermined due to Smith advancing to the NCAA Tennis Singles Championships on Wednesday. The time for the match will be announced late Wednesday after Smith's match is complete.
Smith and Wagland are 16-2 on the year, all from court one, and 7-2 in Southeastern Conference play. The two fell in to 57th-ranked Andrew Harris and Alex Ghilea of Oklahoma in their team's loss in the NCAA Tennis Team Championship quarterfinals. OU went on to take national runner-up.
"Those guys don't know us and we don't know them. Right now we're just focusing on what we have done well," said Shankles. "As the match progresses we'll be able to collect data and see where we need to go from there.
"The good thing about this event is that the doubles matches are three sets, not like regular dual matches," he said. "We will have decisions to make as we play, but we will have time to make them."
The Georgia duo finished their regular season with six-straight wins.
Lis and Feucht, ranked 54th in the nation, played together to start the season, but were split up midseason to help strengthen the Cardinals in doubles play in the regular season. During their time as a duo, the two were 7-0 on the season and all matches were played on court one.
"We are 100 percent focused on the match Thursday," said Shankles. "We're just trying to fully prepared mentally and physically.
Lis finished the regular season with a perfect 17-0 mark as an individual in doubles action and Feucht went on to post a 14-5 mark. Lis played with Jeandre Hoogenboezem and Fechut with freshman Benny Schwiezer.
Both sophomores, Lis and Feucht were first-team All-Southland Conference honorees in singles play. Feucht was 16-8 on the season and Lis was 15-8. The Lamar's men's tennis team finished its season in the Southland Conference Tournament championship game in a 4-2 loss to Texas A&M-Corpus Christi.
Lis and Feucht's started off the season on a great note with a 6-3 win over Louisiana-Lafayette's Colman Wahlberg and Jarred Wynan; The Ragin Cajuns, as a team, were ranked 66th at the time of play. After Lis and Feucht went in an unfinished tie with LSU's No. 1 duo, they went on to reel off three-straight wins in as many matches. In those three matches, the team outscored their opponents 18-6.
After another unfinished match, the two downed Yannick Junger and Tomas Stillman of UTSA, 6-2, and then took care of Southern Mississippi's Wen-Po Tseng and Chao-Yu Huang twice in back-to-back matches.
